A Conversation With Dr. Henry Giroux About Neoliberalism, Race, Justice, and the Culture of Cruelty

He is also an essential voice in this time of trouble, neoliberalism, austerity, and cruelty.

Dr. Giroux has been a great guide for my work here on WARN and ChaunceyDeVega.com.

I am Padawan. He is Master Yoda. Our conversation is instructive, open, and honest because of that fact.

In this episode, I also share my thoughts on religious fundamentalism, Christian fundies, sexual guilt, and the Duggar molestation scandal.

Do I hold back? Never. No mercy. They do not deserve it.

We are now in the fourth day of our twice a year fundraiser. Brother Henry is the opening salvo in a great series of guests for the podcast.

The kind folks who support WARN have gotten us to 20 percent or so of our fundraising goal. Once that destination is reached, I will pull the begging bowl back in, returning to business as usual.

Your kind donations are essential, needed, and necessary. As you will hear in my great conversation with Henry Giroux, we go where we may, and do lots of truth-telling. I do not advertise here on ChaunceyDeVega.com for a reason--I want to be free to tell the truth. Period. He and I do that here for 60 plus minutes.

In this episode of the podcast known as The Chauncey DeVega Show, Henry and I discuss neoliberalism, race, justice, capitalism, police thuggery, and the culture of disposability and cruelty.

Dr. Giroux and I also vibe around public pedagogy, teaching, life, and share some war stories about the political space that is the classroom.

I would like to thank all of the good folks who have donated during the fundraising drive, and who chip in on a monthly basis, to support ChaunceyDeVega.com and my various other online projects.

8 comments:

joe manning
said...

I think most experts in the field would not technically classify Josh Duggar as a pedophile because the sexual acts in question occurred between young siblings which is not uncommon. Pedophilia applies only to adults. The Duggar parents are the culpable offenders for not teaching and monitoring their children as to appropriate sexual interest.

Henry Giroux is correct that the war on teachers, students and education serves to extinguish critical thinking; "everything is in place to turn people into barbarians." A case in point is the "open carry" law just passed in Texas which allows students to pack heat on campus. Its function is to scare teachers and thereby stifle academic freedom. Its enough to make Machiavelli blush.

Giroux's comment that we have to bring together all the identity and separate movements with a comprehensive view of politics is so fundamentally important. Here in Pensacola, I see and have been told of various good progressive organizations existing in their own silos, with leaders unwilling to work together because of personal issues or organizational frictions. Even at the local level, we don't have a comprehensive view of politics. We don't have a common narrative that can unite us in terms of vision, purpose, and action. Giroux, as others, hits the issue. Jason M Williams mentioned the same difficulty of pulling all together in Baltimore. On the other hand, the right-wing can unite the fundamentalist Christian, the charismatic Christian, the Tea Party, and the Klan in one broad movement with a common narrative (New World Order), common purpose (building the Kingdom), and common action plan--demonize, deny rights, and exploit--the rest of us.

The left has historically been fragmented as you point out, lacking a cognitively oriented unified theory (my words). The right has the advantage of coalescing around anti-theoretical amorphous emotional appeals.

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Who is Chauncey DeVega?

I have been a guest on the BBC, National Public Radio, Ring of Fire Radio, Ed Schultz, Sirius XM's Make it Plain, Joshua Holland's Alternet Radio Hour, the Thom Hartmann radio show, the Burt Cohen show, and Our Common Ground.

I have also been interviewed on the RT Network and Free Speech TV.

I am a contributing writer for Salon and Alternet.

My writing has also been featured by Newsweek, The New York Daily News, Raw Story, The Huffington Post, and the Daily Kos.

My work has also been referenced by MSNBC, The Washington Post, USA Today, The Atlantic, The Christian Science Monitor, the Associated Press, Chicago Sun-Times, Raw Story, The Washington Spectator, Media Matters, The Gothamist, Fader, XOJane, The National Memo, The Root, Detroit Free Press, San Diego Free Press, the Global Post, The Lost Angeles Blade as well as online magazines and publications such as Slate, The Week, The New Republic, Buzzfeed, Counterpunch, Truth-Out, Pacific Standard, Common Dreams, The Daily Beast, The Washington Times, The Nation, RogerEbert.com, Ebony, and The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Fox News, Breitbart, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Juan Williams, Herman Cain, Alex Jones, World Net Daily, Twitchy, the Free Republic, the National Review, NewsBusters, the Media Research Council, Project 21, and Weasel Zippers have made it known that they do not like me very much.